Wednesday, January 6, 2016

I,
at this moment, live in Grenoble, a beautiful mountain city of France. I am a
postdoc and I receive a salary which, even by French standard, is considered to be good. I can rent a decent apartment; I can eat best possible food; I can drink
good wine; I can visit some tourist spots; and, after having done all
these, I can save some amount of money in my bank account. Despite all these,
my life now, in many ways, is not as comfortable as it used to be a few years back.

Until a few years back, I had been living at
Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (IIT Kanpur).

Professor Amartya Sen once described
India as the islands of California surrounded by the ocean of sub-Saharan Africa.
IIT Kanpur represented one such California. There were many occasions, the rest
of the Kanpur city, amid extreme hot and humidity had submerged into the
darkness, while we, some residents of IIT Kanpur, were busy playing football
in a completely floodlit ground — the contrast was so huge, so exceptional.

Not
only had we the floodlit playgrounds, IIT Kanpur, in each and every aspect of
life, contrasted the reality of India. The trees in the gardens and the grasses on the grounds consumed more pure water than the auto-drivers on the
streets. IIT Kanpur had almost everything which, the average person of a
developed nation, most of the times, even cannot imagine.

Apart
from well-maintained basic facilities, there were swimming pool, tennis
court, number of play grounds, gymkhana, and music club. Students could use
them either free of cost or with a throw away price. There were yoga training facilities,
French and German language courses, various physical and mental training programs, to mention only few, mostly
very cheap in cost.

The
students did not clean their rooms; there were cleaners. The students did not cook;
there were cooks. The students did not clean their cloths; there were
washer-men. In the canteens, the students commanded – the canteen boys were always ready to
execute their orders.

But
everything was not honkey-dory. It could not be. Almost in each semester, on an
average, one or two students committed suicides. A large fraction – perhaps most – of the IIT Kanpur students were extremely frustrated and pessimists in
nature. IIT Kanpur had its own contradiction, own reality. And very often this
reality was a cruel one. This memoir is a reflection of that reality, that
contradiction.

I
had spent six eventfully eventless, though important and productive, years
(2005-2011) at IIT Kanpur (IITK). This memoir is mostly a simple narration of
what was perceived – and that may or may not be fully correct – by people
surrounded by me. This is not, by any stretch of imagination, an intellectual
analysis of IITK; rather, this reflects on a world of intellectuals as was
viewed by a committed non-intellectual.

I
have tried my best to limit my narratives within the student community. In
other words, I have avoided bringing the faculties among us,
unless absolutely essential.

Since
I was a PhD student at IITK, it is only natural that my narratives are slightly
post-graduate centric. But I had the privilege to be a part of undergraduate
curriculum in another IIT, namely, IIT Bombay. Therefore, I believe I have not
done complete injustice to UG too.

Finally,
I must tell you the truth behind this writing. I, couple of years back,
published a similar writing — a monologue in Bengali. Almost all of my Bengali
friends, some of them are otherwise very critical, deeply appreciated the
events narrated there. Some of them insisted me to bring an English
version of the story. Many friends and comrades, who don’t understand Bengali,
also asked me to translate this into English. This is an effort in
that direction. Though, I must tell you that, this is far from a direct
translation. At the beginning, I made an attempt to translate. But, shortly, I
had to abandon the plan; the inherent structural difference between two
languages — Bengali and English — made it impossible for a non-expert like me.
Therefore, I would say that this, in its own way, is an independent
monologue.

The pictures are quite randomly chosen. They may or may not have any links with the texts. The story is far from being complete —I invite you to bring your version of the narratives.

Part-1

Zoo
and its animals

In
our time, it was largely believed that, the entire student constituency of IITK
was composed of two kinds of species: Homo-sapiens and PhD. Among Homo-sapiens,
B-Tech (Bachelor of Technology) students were considered to be the supreme (9th
incarnation of Lord Vishnu). They were, no doubt, intelligent. They were,
though engineer, exceptionally good in commerce: after graduation, many of them
decided to sell Pepsi and Coca-Cola in USA, and some counted money in various
national and international banks. Other homo-sapiens included M-Tech and MSc students.
Like B-Tech, the M-Tech students were intellectually extraordinary. Within two
years, including one year coursework, they used to produce a strange object
called THESIS. This would, on my part, be extremely uncharitable, as an
alumnus, to unravel the magic behind most of the so-called THESIS. MSc students
were considered to be the last and marginally-survived homo-sapiens. And finally
a species called PhD – the only hitherto-surviving non-homo-sapiens of
IITK.

A
deceased welcome

My
first interaction with IITK took place on a romantic afternoon. It was first or
second week of May of the year 2005. I went there – along with many other
students across the country, some of whom subsequently became my colleagues and
comrades – to confront a PhD interview. The temperature was merely 48 degree
centigrade; and we were mesmerized by the cool breeze of the dry wind. It
carried the ethos of IITK: whosoever may be you are, the temper is always very high.
Interview was good. Much better was the mango-juice, its taste and flavor, sold
by the fruit-vendors in front of Hall-1 main gate. But what fascinated us the
most was the beautiful melancholy of peacock during the dawn. I shall discover,
later on, that many bathroom-singers, including me, were highly influenced by
these national birds.

I went to IITK, for my interview, by
Tufan Express (Cyclone Express in literal translation) from Howrah. The person,
who gave the train this name and designation, must have a very strong sense of
humor; I don’t think there can be any worse train in the universe than this.
During this eventful train journey, I ate the cheapest food possible as I
didn’t yet earn any money; I drank water, from the platform of almost every
station the train stopped, to fight back the midday-May-heat in a second class
non-air-conditioned compartment. Within days of my returning home, I discovered
– failing to discover India not being a Nehru – that, I have acquired typhoid.

MayurBahar

Beggars
in shining India

After
three months of suffering, I again returned back – virtually without flesh and
only with few handful bones like Kareena Kapoor to a certain extent – to IITK,
as a PhD student, to begin the second innings of my never-ending-student-life.
Most of my friends decided to pursue a research career. Many of them moved
abroad, mainly USA, either for better research facilities or loving dollar.
Lack of opportunity or courage had forced many of us to become nationalists.
Some of our relatives and old-friends, coming to know that we had chosen
research carrier, asked: when were we
going to rediscover ‘Relativity’ or ‘Gravity?’ Those who were relatively
sensible asked: how our research in
physics or engineering is going to change their lives immediately? Or is there any remote possibility that the
price of basic commodities, like potatoes or onions, because of our research,
would come down sharply? In a very short time, we recognized that we were
quite isolated from the outside world. That apart, our stipend was quite
pathological. India was then ‘ shining’. The GDP was high; there were plenty of
jobs in the software companies and earning thirty thousand rupees per month,
given most of our background, was not very difficult. Thus within our own
class, with only eight thousand rupees per month, we were virtually
representing Below Poverty Line (BPL) category. Some of my friends, who could
already have secured one, were ditched by their girlfriends. Some observed,
with tears in eyes, that their ex-girlfriends were roaming around software- or
abroad-lobbies. Some, to maintain the relationship-status (status-quo), had quit
research and went ahead with a software job. Those who failed justified the
loss of girlfriends by saying: “Oh! That
was not a true love:” Historically, grapes have always been sour.

Summer
blow

I
have already said that, my first interaction with IITK took place on an
afternoon of May. As time approached towards the end of April, the temperature,
in this northern part of India, had raised to an unbearable level. Normal water
virtually boiled. The entire IITK used to transform into an Arab-dessert; the
men and women, to combat the scorching sun-light, always covered head to feet
during a day-out, even in the absence of Sharia
Law or a Fatwa. Electricity
consumption used to go up; air-conditions, in various laboratories and central
library, would begin to operate with their full capacity. The entire central
library would typically be crowded; even those students who were best known as Sachin Tendulkar in studies –thanks to
air-condition – also appeared in the library very frequently. The books were used
as pillows; even those exceptionally old and thick books which were purchased
before the creation of the universe (Big Bang) and perhaps nobody, including
their authors, had ever touched them, suddenly would become very useful. The
proximity (direct contact to be more precise) between books and heads transferred
knowledge faster. This made IITians so exceptionally knowledgeable. Many wise
observers of IITK believe that this was the only significant discovery – how to
transfer knowledge from book to brain – that deserved a Nobel Prize in its
nearly half a century existence.

In front of the Central Library

During
these dry-summers, the consumption of water, both internally and externally, had
gone up; increased the sale of fruit and fruit-juice; and also, increased the
sale of cold-drinks, mango-shake, banana-shake, and other shakes in various
canteens. In the evening, in the absence of direct sunlight, the ambiance would
become better; though, it took quite a long time to radiate the heat out of
atmosphere. Now people unveiled. Light and casual dresses: barmuda, kurta, skirt
(both mini and non-mini), frock, lungi, pajama etc. would become visible in the
public domain. Students gathered in the canteens.

Fruit vendors

Beauties
and very beauties

Among
all the canteens, in our time, the most popular one was the canteen of Hall-4,
owned by Ashoke. I lived in Hall-4. That apart, another reason behind the
popularity of the canteen was its proximity with the Girls` Hostel-1, which
never had a good canteen. During the summers, plenty of girls, who – like owls,
would completely disappear during the day-time – would suddenly appear,
disappear and reappear in the evening with an eternal beauty. Here, in IITK,
every girl was beautiful. They were beautiful mathematically. There were ten
boys hostels, whereas, there were only two girls-hostels and one of those was
very small. And, therefore, the approximate male-female ratio was 10:1. Thus,
to the boys – by definition – every girl of IITK was either beautiful or
very-beautiful. To my mind, the number of beautiful girls overwhelmingly
outnumbered the very-beautiful one.

Scavengers

Before
I am beheaded by the feminists, let me also describe few things about the boys.
Most of their cheek & chin had been covered by ancient bush, unshaved for
decades. The dirty clothes they wore, which had already become a source of
air-pollution, had been unclean for time immemorial; now these, if washed,
would definitely lead to water-pollution. Altogether, they represented our real
ancestors whose evolution had been stopped in the previous stage. Apart from
their external physical beauty, a bizarre smell, while opened, came out of
their mouth. The public lawns and other places, including toilets, were much
cleaner than their rooms which could only be compared with any standard
well-used dustbins. These scavengers were actually, as you may think, not so
foolish.
They understood that, here, to secure a
darling’s love, mathematically, they would have to fight with ten others;
instead, if they put out a photogenic face – with the help of Photoshop if
necessary, and for most of us it was indeed necessary – on Facebook or Orkut,
and highlight IIT Kanpur anywhere possible, the chances were much better.

Grandfathers

Coming
back to Hall-4, now I shall pay my tribute to the grandfather-class. In my
early days at IITK, I used to observe a group of people who sat all the time
near canteen under a tree known as Bodhi
Brikhs. They, time to time, went
inside and subsequently came out from the canteen. They discussed issues
ranging from KamaSutra to Che Guevara; they knew everything under and above
sun. Most of them were chain-smokers.
Later I learnt that they were a group, indeed a very big group, of PhD students
and had been pursuing research for years. They had seen quite a few directors
of IITK. They had watched – here, in IITK – last few cricket and football world
cup tournaments. And, most importantly, some of them were well versed about the
history and constitution of IITK, and nobody, including the higher authorities,
dared challenging them on any IITK related issues. In my early days, I
disliked, in fact, hated these people. Time passed. God smiled. And then one
day I discovered myself amidst them.

A
shadow of darkness

Hall-4,
no doubt, was unique in many ways among IITK hostels; nevertheless, the hostels
of IITK had some common resemblance; the stories of the canteen boys being one
such. Most of the canteen boys, needless to say, had come or had been brought
from extremely poor and vulnerable families. Almost all of them were very
young. Some of them could be classified as child-labors; though, to be
technically correct, they would usually register their age as per convenience.
They obeyed everyone`s order. They worked day-in-and-day-out. To be fair, the
authorities, especially, the student bodies had always shown humility to them;
and, as far I know, they had made sure that they get maximum wage and comfort
possible. In spite of all these, the undernourishment clearly reflected on
their faces. It’s because of them the real India existed within the artificial
India created in the name, shape, and form of IITK. One day I asked some
canteen boys: Why do you guys work here?
One of them answered: Given our family
and financial background, we shall have to work here or somewhere else; there
is no escape. Here, we get good salary, clean toilets, free water and electricity,
and the company and help of you people. Who would, elsewhere, provide us all
these! Others agreed.

The legend of "Subho da"

Hindu-Catholics
and pure Bengalis

It
was Hall-4, where, I met the Hindu-Catholics who used to preach, or paraphrased
to be more precise, Islamic theology – there is no other god but GOD – in their
own terms. ‘Lord Krishna is the supreme’
was their central theme. They almost monopolized the ‘spiritual’ domain of
IITK. They celebrated Sri Krishna Janamsthami. Wonderful sweets and fruits were
distributed. Thousands of people gathered. The faithful took part in the
rituals. The over-faithful, often described as faith-fool by the non-believers,
flung themselves into the finite feet of infinite Lord. Time to time their activists tried to sell
Bhagbad Geeta as translated by Prabhupad. Some of their activists, directly blessed
by Lord Krishna, used to receive fantastic gifts, like, laptop, mobile etc from
their western comrades. In my time, the key activist, a little in height, was a
very ‘interesting’ person. As a young man, he had possessed a face with
exceptional innocence as if he had never encountered any sin in life. In any
discussion, he would end by saying: whatever
you might say, Lord Krishna is the supreme.

It
was again in Hall-4, where I met the Bengalis who were extremely fluent in
Bengali; who brought Kolkata with them; who had improved their Bengali communication
skill at IITK; who brought Bengali under-wear from Bengal; who cried and died
for Sourav Ganguly; who still waited for Subhas Chandra Bose and believed that
one day Netaji would return and punish Nehru adequately.

Nationalists

IIT
Kanpur was well furnished and well maintained: there were cleaners and other
workers for every hostel, and unlike most of the other government institutions,
they discharged their duties properly. The verandas were cleaned twice. The
trees in the garden received adequate water. The toilets, except for those in
the proximity of the canteen and other public places, were by and large worth
using. IIT Kanpur was too clean to be qualified as an Indian-institution. Some
nationalists objected. During morning brush, they spat the liquid tooth-paste
from their mouth on the ground. Some, to check whether the gravitational
constant had changed significantly, spat from the first or higher floors. Some
of them – the beloved sons of mother-cows, imagining that their shit is holier
than cow-dung – didn’t bother to flush after cow-dung-aftermath in the morning:
after all, these were, in a way, public toilets; and the nationalists wanted to
reflect on the larger ethos of the nation.

Somarosa, like sex, was against Indian culture

There
were other bunch of Hindu-nationalists who, might or might not have the above
qualities, had justified our present caste-systems; who had justified dowry;
who loved Bal Thakrey; and who were unapologetic about the Ajodhya 6th
of December1992 and Gujarat-2002 incidents and aftermaths. To them only eighty
percent Indians were true-Indians. To them everything, before Muslim invasions,
was holy and sacrosanct about India. To them all great achievements of ancient
India took place in isolation. To them Vedas contained all science, arts,
commerce, politics, and comedy and so on. In their complementary world, there
existed a bunch of Indians who blamed their grandfathers for their wrong
geographical choice on the awful days of 1946-47; who, till the date, could not
have made their mind about whether Arabic or English should be their children’s
priority; who, till the date, tried to understand the philosophical insight of
Quantum Mechanics with the help of a 6th or 7th century`s
desert theology. Though, with my great satisfaction, I can tell you that, the
overwhelm majority of the students, irrespective of region or religion, were
nonsectarian by temper and practice.

GPL: the ethos of IITK

Part-2

Wounded
geniuses

I
shall, for a change, now, turn my attention towards academic arena. IITK was
(and still is) most famous, as was already said, for B-Techs and its students
who, later, would prove their credentials as businessmen or businesswomen or
accountants or anything else but engineer; and to be fair, you should not blame
them fully for that, as, most of them wanted to become something else, but were
forced to study engineering by their parents. Even those who were compulsive
engineers lost their enthusiasm after first semester when, for the first time
in life, many of them experienced failed (F) or marginally passed (D) grades.
The average, in a relative grading system, was ‘C’ and was considered to be bad
enough. Thus, most of the students, after few semesters, survived with severely
injured spinal cord. By that time they also crossed twenties; those bizarre
hormones had already been circulating all across their body for quite sometimes
and the youthful zeal wanted to manifest and unfold in the best possible way;
but for boys, as had been analyzed before, there was hardly any chance of
success simply because of laws of probability. The same probabilistic theory
and too much attention on top of that, gave most of the girls the impression,
rightly or wrongly, that they disserved a perfect prince who would look like Hrithik
Roshan and have an intelligence of Einstein. In the end, both sex was unhappy
and lived mostly with broken or unpleasant heart along with already injured
spinal cord. The combinations of all these, after couple of years, created so
many physically and mentally handicapped undergraduates that hardly anyone was
left out to be qualified to be a competent engineer. Some individuals, despite
all these, stood tall; they played games; they played music; they were involved
in social activism; and having done all these they secured ‘A’ grades almost in
every course. Because of this group of individuals Brand-IITK survived.

Getting
a chance to study at IITK, especially for undergraduates, was tough; rather
tougher was to survive, and perhaps no one could feel this better than an
average MSc student. B-Tech, as has already been said, was tough too no doubt,
but nevertheless the students got four years to understand the ocean where they
were supposed to swim, and therefore, they, if careful enough, could learn how
to swim adequately and more importantly could identify the sharks they should
avoid and abscond. MSc being a merely two year course, students didn’t have this
opportunity or luxury. And the humble bookish, most of the cases, discovered
that their hands and legs have been chopped off smoothly before understanding
anything. A professor name withheld, with prolific career both as a student and
a faculty, once told me: “I thank god
that I never have studied in IITs; otherwise I could not have come here as a
professor.”

Theses
factories

One
of the standard measures of achievements, for a professor, was the number of
students he/she had supervised, for their thesis, in his/her entire career. For
basic sciences, in the absence of job opportunities, there were many students
who pursued PhD research as carrier. But for engineering departments the story
was quite opposite. Thus, the engineering faculties, desiring to supervise a
thesis, depended heavily on M-Tech students. And, therefore, M-Tech existed.
M-Tech, in principle, was a two-year course including one-year coursework.
Thus, effectively within one year, the M-Tech students had to produce a thesis.
As a PhD student, even after two to three years, most of us virtually struggled
even just to identify a problem worth pursuing, whereas, most of the M-Tech
students, with their extraordinary wisdom, completed their thesis within a
year. Once I asked a professor – who had to be present during many awful M-Tech
thesis defenses – about the quality of the M-Tech thesis, and in his words: “Well, you know Dibyendu, most of the M-Tech
theses are quite extraordinary. Sir Isaac Newton observed that the apples fall
towards earth due to gravity, and most of our M-Tech students have subsequently
proven that not only apples, but also guavas, bananas, mangoes and many other
fruits –if not all – fall towards
earth due to gravity.”

A solitary afternoon

Fishes
and Fishers

Before
I turn my attention towards the PhD students – the alleged researchers or original thinkers of IITK – for a change, let us briefly visit one
of the temples of IITK, namely, Southern Block Laboratories. This is a big
building; most of the physics and many chemistry laboratories were set up here;
there were also few engineering laboratories. It had a canteen known as Faculty
Lounge. During most of our time, I think until 2008-09, the canteen was popular
for three-rupee tea and four-rupee special-tea. Except for paying a rupee extra
it was impossible to appreciate the specialty of the special-tea, and,
therefore, the experienced and radical tea-takers hardly consumed any
special-tea. Except for tea, it sold kachori, samosa and pakoda. It sold
pastries and patties. One could get cold-drinks. During lunch hours, it
prepared, on a small scale, some typical lunch items: dal, chawal, puri, sabji,
parotha etc. Nearby this canteen was a fountain. Proximity to that was the
central library. Many people, apart from those working in Southern Block
Laboratories, came to this canteen in groups and also individually. Altogether,
Faculty Lounge was fairly popular and busy.

In front of the faculty Lounge: waiting for tea

The dynamism of the Faculty Lounge was very
well reflected by the dynamism – inter and intra, and mutual – of the various
departments. Amongst all the science and engineering departments – to most of
the male PhD students – most popular and interesting one was the Biological
Science Department. It had plenty of female students. This was the only
department which, in comparison to boys, had proportionate number of girls. Now
I shall have to tell you a perception – that may or may not be accurate and
politically correct for sure – which was fairly popular in our time. It was
believed that, amongst science students, most of the cases, only those who
didn’t feel comfortable with and scored badly in mathematics chose biology. The
uncertainty principle of nature, on the other hand, makes sure that the brain
and beauty cannot coexist. And, therefore, whenever somebody discovered an
unknown beauty, it was quintessentially believed that she either cut trees or
killed frogs. From the Biological Science Department, two canteens, Faculty
Lounge and Chemical Canteen, were almost at equidistant. Thus, roughly, fifty
percent girls of the Biological Science Department, obeying the laws of
probability, came to Faculty Lounge for a tea break. After some time, the
fishers could learn, from experience of observations, when the fishes would
come. And, therefore, time to time, the Faculty Lounge was over crowded.

Beggars’
apprehensions

Returning
back to PhD life, the most memorable part was the coursework. The entire one
(first) year was dedicated to it. During the coursework, a student was supposed
to revise, master and internalize the knowledge she/he had gathered from
bachelors to masters. Since the students came from different universities, to
bring uniformity, as once explained by a professor, this coursework was
constructed. I don’t know whether the purpose had been fully served, but in any
case, coursework was a very decent get-together. Students worked collectively.
They copied each other’s assignment. They identified the poor graders who had
the potential to make their lives hell. They identified, rightly or otherwise,
the demon & Satan. They identified GOD, occasionally though.

Those
who survived the coursework battle, now, could formally dream a path-breaking
research career. But still a small hurdle – another examination, mostly, in the
form of an interview – had to overcome. A fanciful name – comprehensive
examination – was given to this battle. All possible questions – like, the mass
of light, or, the speed of Einstein, or, the chemical formula of Osama Bin
Laden – were asked. Students answered. The success rate, if not in the first
attempt but in the second attempt for sure, was nearly hundred percent. Once
done, the students could now formally dream to de-discover relativity.

Selfless
fathers

At
this stage, the PhD students – though, now in the second year, but nevertheless
still young – suddenly discovered a change in their lives and body languages.
There was no coursework, and therefore no get-together, no gathering. The old
collective effort suddenly disappeared, and instead, life took a new turn; a
new life began as a new entry in a well-crowded or almost-empty laboratory. A
new struggle began. Students began to recognize, in a strange and detached way,
the abstract and peculiar nature of their profession. Subsequently, they could
realize that life was too much dependent on one person, called, guide i.e. the
thesis supervisor. And, therefore, guides were secretly called by Baap–the eternalFather.

The
young fathers, thanks to the idea of promotion, were normally accessible. They
worked with their children. But, most of the cases, young-fathers lacked
adequate funding. They, therefore, many times, compelled to reduce the stature
of their children to that of a working class people. The old-fathers, now
mostly professors, on the other hand, were wealthy in general. Their children
may or may not be productive but could lead a lavish scientific life.
Old-fathers were mostly administrators and not so easily accessible. Despite
these small differences, young or old, given an opportunity, the fathers could
sacrifice everything for the children and nation in general. One could very often
observe one such instance of sacrifice during summer vacations– from May to
July. During these times, while the entire student community of IITK enjoyed sunbath,
these fathers, instead, taking great burdens on their shoulders,
travelled USA and Europe, to propagate the scientific glory of the nation.

Extraordinary
non-achievements

It
is often said that science and research are without any boundary. The behavior
and activities of the majority of the PhD students were, by and large, a
perfect reflection of that idea. Mechanical Engineers didn’t know how to open
(forget repairing) the door of a car. Civil Engineers wanted to become Civil
Servants. Chemists loved Kalidas and
tried hard to cut the branch of the tree they sat on. Physicists confused
themselves with physicians and discussed a concoction of politics and poetry. With
time, as the scholars grew older, their preoccupied enthusiasm had slowly been
substituted by the thought process of waves and vibrations of negative energy.
Instead of discussing what could be scientifically achieved in a given
circumstance, most of the times, they (read ‘we’) discussed why certain things could
not be achieved. Instead of discussing independent ideas, the valuable times
were wasted criticizing the guides and the systems. Altogether, they reflected
the behavior of perfect researchers: one could learn from them, to become an
ideal researcher, what must not be done. But their exceptional behavior and
attitude towards science was not an isolated event; they merely continued the well-established
rules, legacy and culture. But what about the fathers? Well, I am afraid, I can
only quote or paraphrase the old Biblical saying: Anyone who has seen the son has seen the father. And, therefore, it
is no surprise that, IITK and IITs in general have not produced anything
substantially – no Nobel Laureate, virtually no path-breaking work – worth
proud of. I know – at the core of my heart – that, my narration, perhaps, is
bit too exaggerated, but, nevertheless, I don’t know any alternative way, in
the absence of a counter narrative, which could explain the extraordinary
non-achievements we, the IITians, have ensured in the last nearly fifty years
of its existence.

A
worth investment nevertheless

Howsoever
disappointing – especially, the state-of-art fundamental research – might have
been the grand narratives of IITK or IITs in general, the individual excellence
and effective personal achievement, in financial sense of the term, was worth
admiring. Hardly any student, with an IITK degree, was ever unemployed. The
dynamism – that, the course structure and overall activism generated – was a
real blessing for the undergraduates, and, thus, the generations of
undergraduates had been welcomed by the top American universities. Those who wanted
to quit academic arena also found a respectable and financially lucrative
positions in the banking and the corporate sectors. As a whole, for those who
survived for four or five years, IITK was a decent investment for sure.

The
PhD students, on the other hand, did master the art of patience and
perseverance, and learnt how to absorb all kinds of abuses and insults from
within and outside. The experimentalists got some decent basic trainings –
like, how to cut metals, how to carry gas cylinders, how to mix two dangerous
liquids, how to boil water and so on – which made them, in distant future,
committed and competent househusbands or housewives.

Butchers

The
stories of the individual departments, beyond these grand narratives, were also
awesome. Biology Department, as has been hinted already, produced some fine
butchers specializing in frog and rat slaughtering. Some specialized how to
halal a plant. Some collected insects: mosquitoes, bees, ants, and so on, and
kept the campus clean. The profound and deep attachments with the nature
provoked the biology students to become a permanent member of the beautiful
campus; and, in fact, they did top – not necessarily in terms of performance,
but in terms of prolonging PhD – amongst the students. The PhD life of some of
the biology students extended up to almost a decade, and the average being
almost the same.

The
Fekus

The
physicists joined the queue. It took almost 7 to 8 years, especially for the
experimentalists, to submit a thesis. In the meantime, the students discussed
politics while taking cups of teas in various, especially in the Southern
Block, canteens. The experimentalists were trained in metal-cutting and
polishing, soldering and wiring, and various other technical stuffs. Time to
time, one could see them carrying liquid nitrogen and helium (if available at
all) bottles on the floors of the Southern Block Laboratories. Theoreticians
were trained how to log on and shut-down a computer. Two segments, theory and
experiment, did exist; but they hardly interacted; there were hardly any serious
collaborations. Most of the cases, there were no significant collaborations
within experimentalists or theoreticians as well; many times, it gave
impressions that, two outstanding neighbors, India and Pakistan, were standing
side by side.

Thinker

Bonded
labors

In
terms of research work and reputation, the most remarkable department,
arguably, was the Chemistry Department. Each supervisor, on an average,
supervised more than ten students. Apart from PhD students, each laboratory had
to accommodate many masters and other project students. Altogether, most of the
chemistry laboratories could be compared only with the typical fish-markets of
Kolkata; half of the total PhD students of IITK, therefore, belonged to this
department. Apart from the number strength, in the national level scientific
discourse, as was hinted at the beginning, this department played an important
role. Many respected, respectable, and not-so-respectable professors of this
department were Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Awardee. This was, in a way, quite
exceptional achievement, especially, given that the cousin department, i.e.,
the Physics Department, had none. The Bhatnagar culture made, quite rightly so,
most of the professors of the Chemistry Department very ambitious. But who, if
not students, could be employed to fulfill the ambitions? Almost in every
laboratory, students, therefore, worked very hard. But in some laboratories,
really very few in numbers, they had to work like bonded labors. They worked
all seven days. They worked from morning 8 to midnight or more. They hardly
took any holidays. These students, slowly, transmuted to robots and became
intellectually feeble.

Fish market

Makers
of invisible technologies

IITs,
as the T suggests, were established to achieve technological excellence, which
was impossibility without a special emphasis on the technological research. In
the recent times – as had been articulated by director and other IITK stalwarts
in the responsible positions – the efforts had been made to transform IITK into
a predominantly post-graduate institute committed to fundamental and engineering
research from being mainly an undergraduate institute committed to teaching.
This, along with many other socio-economic factors, had led an increase in the
number of PhD students in various engineering departments. Even then, the
strength and health of overall engineering PhD students were far from
satisfactory level. There were hardly any visible engineering research outputs.
Apart from few exceptional cases, forget about innovating any mesmerizing
technology, even the well-established technologies could not be fully explored.
The best and brightest engineers were mostly theoreticians; IITK had been far
from being self-sufficient in research; despite having so many engineering
departments and workshops, IITK hardly designed, fabricated and automated any
state-of-the-art device that could be employed in real life or to pursue any fundamental
research.

Part-3

Beyond
the life and death

In
a men dominated society (in terms of numbers) of IITK, the girls’ hostels, as
has been described already, played an important role and quite understandably
so. Much more important role was played
by another divine place situated almost equidistant from the two girls` hostel.
Even Yjoma, the god of death, was horrified by this place and its architects.
It was believed that, Tagore dedicated his famous song, Beyond the Life and Death, to this place and its players. This was
IITK hospital. Some remarkable medical doctors enlightened it’s ambient. Some
of them had an impression that ‘pain’ is the main reason behind all kinds of
diseases, be it physical or mental, or, be it an injury or something else. They
began their treatments, for any disease, with a particular type of pain-killer.
No one before these doctors, in human and inhuman civilization and its medical
history, recognized that one particular tablet can cure so many diseases simultaneously.
The second category of doctors had a different approach altogether. Even for an
insignificant or no disease – like, nail or hair pain – they prescribed almost
ten to fifteen different medicines and relied upon chances and probabilities.
In the era of inter disciplinary subjects, like, biophysics or biochemistry,
these doctors – perhaps, the only in the universe – intermixed medicine,
statistics and humanity. But the most astonishing class of doctors belonged to
a different category. They were extremely philosophical minded. They
internalized and lived with profound Hindu philosophy: They were convinced that
God exists everywhere, and every living creature has soul and thereby equal in
spiritual sense. And, therefore, they disregarded that human being – being
apparently different from mice, frogs or guinea pigs– can claim some extra
materialistic benefits. Drawn by this spiritual belief they applied all their
brain-born innovations – the way, the biology students, in biological
laboratories, do the same to the mice, frogs or guinea pigs – to the patients,
especially, if the patients happened to be students. I had the good fortune to
experience some of their inexplicable excellence. One of their legendary
representatives had demonstrated on my right hand ‘how to convert a small skin infection to a permanent black spot’.
Later on I learnt that that particular doctor was a great fan & follower of
Swami Vivekananda. Following his guru’s advice and desire, he wanted to keep a
permanent impression on my arm.

The true love of sisters (nurses)

Defeaters
of Mughals

IITK
had a restaurant. Its name was Campus Restaurant, abbreviated as CR. It was
qualified as a ‘restaurant’ because its name carried the word ‘restaurant’. It
didn’t have any toilet. As has been said already, the most of the toilets of
IITK were very well maintained, whereas, the nearest common public toilet of CR
was a vomiting center. It was never cleaned. Hardly anybody could show the
courage to use it with or without an empty stomach. This extraordinary free
toilet facility made the ambiance of CR – especially, for young, romantic and
busy couple who forgot to use toilet before meeting – very pleasant. Inside the
Campus the ambiance was decent. The waiters were normally polite and humble.
The available foods were even more humble. There was no fish. Every meat-item
tasted exactly the same; hardly anyone could make a distinction between
chilly-chicken and honey-chicken. It was a holy place: there was no beef or
pork; the faithful, the protectors of mother-cows and father-pigs, could come
without hesitation. The only available meats were chicken and goat-mutton.
Mutton- or Chicken-Biriyani had been prepared, perhaps, by extreme right wing
Hindu nationalists. Legend says: Mughals, after having eaten Mutton-Biriyani in
CR, dared further invading India; the tastes were so extraordinary, and could
only be described as “the tasteless wonders”. Some vegetable items, like, Mewa
Alu and Navaratan Korma, were worth eating. IITK had many vegetarians and it
was the only ‘restaurant’. CR survived.

CR: it did not have a toilet

Festival
of Chamchas

IITians
celebrated – going beyond day to day life’s struggle for existence and the
rat-races for grades – some social and some inclusively IITK-born festivals.
One such festival, an inclusively IITK-born, was the celebration of Hall-Day.
Each hostel, known as Hall, used to choose an arbitrary day, apparently for no
reason, to celebrate. The friends living in other hostels were invited on the
eventful evening of the Hall-Day. A mammoth amount of foods and drinks (no
alcohol) were arranged. Students invited their friends. Students, especially
the M-Techs and PhDs, also invited their guides; PhD students invited them
mostly unwillingly; many M-Tech students had a different interest altogether.
It is believed – at least I know many who did – that, feeding someone’s stomach
is the best way to please a person. Hall-Day was a descent investment in that
direction, though, by heart, like PhD, the M-Tech students mostly prayed
guide’s absence on that evening. Altogether, Hall-Day, like marriage, was a
great day for the guests and a nightmare for the hosts. The host-students, as
long the guides were present, maintained their calm, quiet and gentleness. They
prayed for their guide’s quick departure. The secret drinks – when the GOD
finally approved their prayers – were opened. There was discotheque. Those who
desired danced.

Virgin
vultures

In
some sense IITK life was extremely harsh. Students were mostly confined within
the campus. Those, who, wished to go outside campus to visit Kanpur city, were
repelled; Kanpur city was too clumsy and dirty compared to the ambiance and
atmosphere of IITK campus. Experienced people used to say: the most beautiful
place of Kanpur was IITK itself. Inside IITK, the segregation of boys and girls
were made as much as possible. There were separate hostels, as you have already
learnt, for boys and girls. After midnight the boys and girls – including the
post-graduates, some of whom could well be nearly in their thirties or more –
could not enter each other’s personal room. This was the law. Even in a normal
hour, a boy, by rule, could not close the door of his room in presence of a
girl and vice versa. Any sexual activities, by law, were condemned and prohibited.
IITians – like any other authentic and pure Indians – were taught that sex is a
sinful act: more than one billion Indians have tumbled from the sky. They were
also taught that Kamasutra was written by Russians in Latin language and the
temples of Khajuraha belonged to England and constructed by French women. This
sexual segregation and brute-force-virginity culture made most of the students
(post-graduate for sure) extremely un-smart in front of the opposite sex. The
students, in the absence of a real pleasure, took shelter in the world of
fantasy. Two hands were used efficiently; and, on those awful physical and
psychological journeys, the only comrades were the wonderful collections of
movies in the common students’ server.
Smarter people (couples) broke the rule. The losers – who could only
enjoy the bizarre sound, they were familiar with after watching Basic Instinct,
came out from the neighboring closed-doors rooms – felt vulnerable and jealous.
Their cultural consciousness raised high. Time to time they complained to the
authority.

A
fire in the heart

I
have already said a few words about Hall-day celebration. Hall-day was more of a
local celebration in the sense that each hostel separately celebrated its
hall-day. Though, a large number of students living in other hostels and people
living elsewhere were invited, but neither everybody could be invited nor
everyone could be accommodated within the limited space of a hall. That apart,
Hall-days were no official IITK festival; each hostel celebrated its day in its
own capacity; many times, many hostels decided not to celebrate hall-days at
all. It demanded a more universal grand celebration. It demanded pan IITK
festivals. And, here came Antaragni- the only pan IITK cultural festival.

Antaragni
generated hope. As its Hindi name suggests, it generated fire in the heart.

End of October was normally chosen for
Antaragni. Though, the exact timing was flexible. It broadly depended on that
particular year. It took place after second mid-semester and approximately a
month before the end-semester. At this point in time the students really
required a break. Antaragni generally lasted for four days. Around hundred
colleges and universities participated. There were dance, music, song, fashion-
shows, discotheque, art & painting and so on. Most of the programs were
competition based. Winners got thousands of rupees and a celebrity status for a
day. Some programs were for pure entertainment and cultural cohesion. The best
music bands and individual music personalities would be invited. They
performed. The crowd enjoyed the music. The crowd enjoyed the gatherings. Music
followed by poetry or the other way. Hindi Kavi
Sammelan, the gathering of poets, drew many people. This was the best time
to improve Hindi vocabulary. The fragrance of sound purified the air polluted
by the street Hindi and slangs of IITians for the whole year.

For IITK communities, especially for
those who had already spent few years at IITK, Antaragni was just a change. A
break, a much required break: A break to break the monotonic day-to-day events
of mostly, so to speak, an eventless life. But for most of the outsider
participants, it was a dream. It was a long awaited dream which finally became
reality, became true. The outsider participants heard so much of the myth of
IITK and its B-Tech students. Now they could eye-witness some of them. They
could enjoy their proximity and company. They came prepared. The investments
were visible. The well-dressed girls – including those who had no desire to
take part in fashion-show or any other contests – invested time and money in
the expensive beauty-parlors. It was evident from their recent hair-cut. It was
evident from their facial expression and body-language. It was evident from
their facial complexion while juxtaposed alongside their carefully exposed body
parts. The boys didn’t lack behind.

The
love & emotion dynamics of IITK found a new equilibrium. The conventional
idea of beauty and very beauty took a
back seat. The girls-chasers of IITK tested their fates. After four days they
ended up where they began. The love & emotion dynamics of IITK returned
back to its old equilibrium.

Readers’ comments:

Dear Readers. IITK
stories can never be completed. Many things will always be missing. I am ending
on my part. Now it is your turn. Feel free to add your comments. Say whatever
you like. If you want to add your memories do that. Good luck.